Feature Article February 26, 2004
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Consultants report may mean changes to Library service
A consultant hired by the board of the Kingston Frontenac Public Library has not yet delivered his draft report, but speculation has begun about the possibility of changes to the system, which might include the closing of some smaller rural branches.
In a television interview after the meeting, new board chair Jim Neill speculated about the possibility of increasing the size and scope of the library branches in Sydenham and Sharbot Lake and closing some other rural branches.
However, Jim Morgenstern of DMA Planning and Management Services of Missisauga, the consultant who is preparing the report, said his company has prepared some background reports on KFPL and trends in Library service delivery, but we have not completed our analysis or made any recommendations yet. He expects to have a report by the middle of April, with a series of recommendations aimed at designing a library system for the future.
The study we are doing asks us to begin with a blank page and look ahead 20 25 years. How many libraries of what type should we have? We are looking at everything, from the expansion of branches to meet expected population increases, especially in South Frontenac and the former Kingston Township, to other changes, including the possibility of closing branches, Morgenstern said.
The former Frontenac Public Library, which merged with the Kingston Library to form the KFPL, had library branches in all but one of the townships that made up Frontenac County at the time. Currently, there are rural branches in Cloyne, Plevna, Ompah, Arden, Mountain Grove, Sharbot Lake, Parham, Hartington, Sydenham and Storrington. Circulation figures, and the square footage and location of the existing libraries are being considered by Morgenstern, as are the projections of a stable population in Central and North Frontenac, and a population increase in South Frontenac. Still, Morgenstern said we recognise that libraries are more than the statistics that underlie the system. They function as meeting places and community centres, and those are important considerations as well.
The board of the KFPL will make decisions based on the report. All members of the library board have been invited to a tour of all the facilities in the system including the rural ones, in the near future.
